


Cold Light

by wilderswans



Series: Widomauk 30 Day NSFW Challenge [2]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: (for now) - Freeform, 30 Day NSFW Challenge, Caleb's violent knee, Intimacy, M/M, Making Out, Molly is full of gross feelings, Nott is smart give her some credit Molly, Secret Relationship, Soft Widomauk, naked kissing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-10
Updated: 2018-07-10
Packaged: 2019-06-08 05:10:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15236046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wilderswans/pseuds/wilderswans
Summary: Molly wakes just as the watery light from the winter dawn is beginning to creep through the windowpane, and for a moment, forgets where he is.(Day 2 of the 30 Day NSFW OTP challenge: Naked Kissing)





	Cold Light

**Author's Note:**

> This takes place the morning after A Famine In Your Heart, and makes more sense if you read it beforehand. 
> 
> I'm going to be honest, I'm a little overwhelmed (and very grateful) for the kudos+comments everyone have left on the first work in this lil NSFW challenge series. To be honest, I was pretty anxious about branching into writing for a new ship/fandom, especially because this is the first large continuous fan work undertaking I've tried to do in a long time. So, I'm incredibly grateful to you all for taking the time to read, kudos and comment (if you feel so inclined)! 
> 
> Thank you ♥ (shooting star .gif)

Molly wakes just as the watery light from the winter dawn is beginning to creep through the windowpane, and for a moment, forgets where he is.

Then he feels someone sigh next to him, the soft noise sleep-warm and content, and immediately remembers as Caleb stirs next to him. Molly risks cracking one eye open and is immediately rewarded with the sight of Caleb cocooned in the worn and anonymous blankets of the inn, his skin pale and dusted with freckles in the weak morning light.

He is, without a doubt, the most beautiful thing Molly has seen in a good long while. He can’t resist the urge to touch, to gently smooth the sleep-creased brow of worry as Caleb makes an unelegant little lip-smacking noise and rolls over.

So, they’re sleeping together now, but haven’t actually _slep_ t together yet. Molly is still delighted beyond reason by this development. There’s plenty of time for the sweaty bits later - why shouldn’t he enjoy this as it is now?

He drifts for a little while, half-lulled back into sleep by the heavy quiet in their room, by the soft and slightly wheezy rhythmic sound of Caleb breathing. It’s not quite a snore, but speaks to something like dry sinuses. That’s what he gets, Molly thinks without heat, for spending all his time with his nose in dusty old books.

Over the course of the night Caleb had drifted closer and then further back, retreating to the edge of the bed, as if even in sleep he didn’t trust himself to be held and wanted. And that, Molly thinks, is a crying shame. He’d told Caleb last night they all have their baggage; it doesn’t matter to him how fast or slow they go. But still, it’s nice to wake up in the small hours of the morning and drowsily realize the man you fancy, the one whose brain had jumped right out of his skull once you were both naked and getting friendly, had snuggled up to you in his sleep and begun the process of drooling comfortably onto your shoulder. It made Molly’s heart do all sorts of ridiculous things before he fell back asleep thirty seconds later.

Molly’s slipped back into a doze, lulled by the sound of Caleb’s breath and the press of his warm skin, when there’s a soft rapping on the door.

Instantly, Caleb’s limbs go rigid, his breath catches in his nose as someone calls very gently from the hall, “Caleb? Are you awake?”

Nott.

_Balls._

Molly cracks his eyes open again to meet Caleb’s wide blue ones; in the course of about three seconds an entire silent conversation goes something like:  
_Nott is outside and I don’t know what to tell her -_  
_How will she react if she comes in and finds me compromising your virtue?_  
_BADLY._  
_Tell her something, just don’t let her in here!_

Molly punctuates that last with a pointed widening of his eyes, and begins to slide down to the foot of the bed, pulling the covers over himself as he goes. With luck, if Nott barges in, she’ll just think the blankets are especially tangled around Caleb instead of there being a suspiciously tiefling-sized lump in dangerous proximity to Caleb’s bits.

Molly gets an eyefull as he’s trying to not move beneath the covers. They’re very good bits, ones he’s looking forward to getting thoroughly acquainted with in due time.

“Sorry, Nott, I, ah - I am just putting on some clothes, please do not come in,” Caleb calls back to his friend. “I will - _ah_ ,” he stammers, because Molly has laid down to let temptation roll right over him and pressed a kiss against his thigh beneath the covers, because it was  _there_ and he  _wanted to_   “- I will be downstairs for breakfast soon, just give me a few minutes.” And, because Caleb is delightful, he tries to knee Molly in the nose in retaliation. Molly dodges away, trying not to laugh as he holds Caleb’s violent, slightly knobbly knee down and presses another kiss to it in apology.

Nott is quiet and for a moment Molly is certain the game is up, and is mentally preparing himself to be eviscerated by a tiny goblin girl before he hears her chirp, “Don’t be too long, you know how Beau is with the bacon,” before the faint sound of her little footfalls indicate she’s heading for the stairs.

Caleb lets out a deep breath as Molly re-emerges from beneath the covers. He glowers at the tiefling, cheeks pink in the morning light.

“Mister Mollymauk,” he begins.

“Mister Caleb,” Molly says, trying not to smirk.

Caleb, unexpectedly and delightfully, goes even pinker at that and lets his head fall back against the pillows, flopping an arm over his eyes and nose. “You are a damn menace.”

“It’s part of my charm,” Molly says breezily, hauling himself up so he and Caleb are once more pressed side to side. “Though I thought for sure she was going to come in and skin me alive.”

“I did as well,” Caleb murmurs from beneath his arm. Then he mutters something in Zemnian, something that weeks and weeks on the road with Caleb makes Molly suspect he might be calling him a fucking asshole, but there’s not an ounce of heat in it. Something about the moment grips him. He can’t tell if it’s the certain way the pale morning sun highlights Caleb’s hair, or the note of begrudging fondness in Caleb’s muttered insult, or the way they’re pressed together, skin to skin, and Caleb isn’t retreating. Molly feels his heart do that peculiar circus tumble from last night again, and has to stop himself from frowning down at his chest.

Instead of saying something stupid like, _Is this what intimacy feels like?_ or _I would very much like to get the permission of your tiny drunken murder friend to court you_ , or _My heart goes all wobbly when you’re around and when you let me see through all the dirt to_ you _, should I be concerned? Should we call for Jester?_ Molly instead asks, “Well, before we’re both dragged back to reality, may I kiss you again?”

Caleb actually lifts his arm from his eyes, looking startled at the question. Molly’s about to take it back and roll himself out of bed, forget he ever asked, when Caleb turns pink again and ducks his head in a silent nod. Molly doesn’t have to say anything else at that, just gratefully leans forward and bump his nose against Caleb’s before bringing their lips together.

The heat of last night’s kisses has, understandably, fizzled out. Caleb’s breath is a little stale but Molly’s certain his is too; it doesn’t matter, not really, because Caleb tilts his head just so, so their lips slot together perfectly at a perfect angle and one of his hands drifts up to lazily tangle in the sleep-tousled curls at the back of Molly’s head. Molly can’t help himself, it unlocks a little moan from his throat and he can’t pull it back in. Caleb parts his lips as if to receive the soft noise, and unbidden, a mental image of Caleb accepting every single filthy sound Molly wants to pour into him slams, full-force, into Molly’s skull. He has to bite the inside of his own cheek when they part for a breath of air.

 _Time for that later_ , he chastises himself.

By now Caleb looks delightfully sleep-rumpled and reddened from kissing; his lips and cheeks are thoroughly flushed. His hand has not loosened its grip on Molly’s hair, and Molly thinks he catches a hint of gratitude in Caleb’s eyes before he goes back in for another kiss.

For several minutes, the world shrinks down to this: A perfect cocoon of warmth on a winter’s day, early morning sunlight, shared breath. Caleb’s mouth beneath his, yielding to his tongue when he darts it out for a questioning taste of Caleb’s bottom lip, the little thrill of permission. Skin against skin, sticking together from proximity, the little spaces between them growing heated. Molly hasn’t had a good necking session in so long, and he can’t ever recall one being this perfect.

Molly nips softly at Caleb’s lower lip, feeling Caleb’s hips twitch forward weakly when he presses a trail of lush little nips down from Caleb’s mouth, across the strong angle of his jaw, across the skin of his throat. He feels, rather than hears, Caleb give a soft gasp at the same time he feels Caleb’s very interested erection brush against his thigh, and it is with a measure of finality that he pulls back, placing one last firm kiss on Caleb’s lips.

“We’d better get downstairs,” says Molly, when Caleb’s eyes open, filled with confusion. The wizard groans in a way that makes Molly’s own anatomy stand up and take notice. “If you’re much longer Nott will probably come back up.”

“Has anyone told you it is impolite to initiate things you don’t intend to follow up on?” Caleb grumbles.

“Mister Caleb, I am _wounded_ ,” Molly says, holding a hand to his chest like a sincerely offended old crone. “You act as though I have no intention of following up when, in fact, I have several detailed plans for how thoroughly and vigorously I intend to follow up with you. I intend to follow up with you several times, in fact.”

Caleb goes gratifyingly red and slinks out of bed, turning away from Mollymauk to put his clothes on, but not before Molly catches a glimpse of the flush spreading all the way down his throat to his navel. Molly chuckles, sliding out of bed himself and beginning the process of shimmying into his pants and boots. Despite the silence as they dress, it isn’t awkward, even if Molly has to make a silent promise to his dick that he’ll schedule a time and a place in the immediate future to think about the noises Caleb had made, the minute and helpless twitches of his hips. Molly is no clairvoyant, but he doesn’t need to break out his cards to divine the fact that Caleb is likely making the same silent promise to himself.

Caleb finishes dressing first despite his many layers, and is about to open the door when Molly leaps up from where he’s been sitting on the side of the bed as he laces his boots. The wizard pauses with his hand on the doorknob, looking perplexed.

“Just a moment, darling,” says Molly, crossing the room awkwardly with one boot open and flapping with each step. He knows he looks ridiculous; he doesn’t care. He reaches out to gently cup Caleb’s cheek with a hand, guiding him with the barest suggestion of touch into another kiss. This is less heated by far, almost chaste in comparison to the kisses of last night and a few minutes ago, but somewhere in the press of lips Molly can feel something like promise between them. When they part, there’s the barest hint of a smile at the corners of Caleb’s mouth when he looks at him.

“Thank you, Mollymauk,” Caleb says.

“It’s for my own benefit, really,” Molly replies breezily, shrugging. “One last, to hold me over until we can do this again.”

Caleb fidgets, ducking his gaze down at the floor. “I hope that we can make it soon. And that, when we do, I won’t....” he trails off awkwardly. Molly shakes his head, waving Caleb off.

“Go on downstairs,” he says gently, before Caleb can get too mired in shame to leave the room. “Try to save some bacon for me.”

Caleb does, leaving Molly to the tedious business of dressing and waiting a proper amount of time before he can make his own way downstairs. For a minute he considers opening the window and dropping into the alleyway below so he can meet the rest of the party in the tavern like he’s just returning from a late night out, but the frost on the windowsill and the warm cozy feeling of the room he shared with Caleb convince him otherwise. As he's sitting on the bed, he can still catch the smell of Caleb on the rumpled sheets. He resists burying his face in them to inhale for all of thirty seconds, wishes he could fall back asleep in this warm little cocoon of dangerously sappy feelings he's somehow grown. 

He doesn’t have Caleb’s perfect sense of time but he’d wager it’s approaching half an hour before he slips from Caleb’s room, checking up and down the hall to make sure no one sees him leaving a room that isn’t his, before he goes to the washroom to splash some water on his face and head downstairs.

“Look who the sleepyhead is this morning!” Jester says through a mouthful of pastry. Flakes of crust stick to the corner of her mouth. “We were starting to think you would never wake up!”

“Good morning, good morning,” Molly says jovially to the table at large, yawning for added theatrical benefit. He plunks down on a stool next to Fjord, eyeing his plate of scrambled eggs and the generous slab of bread covetously. “Any of this for me?”

“No, but you can get your own,” Fjord says, rolling his eyes when Molly swipes a piece of bacon anyway. “I’ll be gettin’ that back, with interest, thank you.”

Molly does surrender a piece of bacon back to Fjord when he gets his own plate of food, content to lean forward and eat and listen to the easy morning chatter of the Mighty Nein amid the general din of the tavern. Beau and Jester are still laughing at something Nott had said last night, Fjord cutting into the conversation every so often with an easy, laconic remark. It’s only when Caleb pushes the remainder of his plate at Nott to devour at lightning speed that he deems it safe to meet Caleb’s gaze, and has to shove a forkful of eggs into his mouth to keep himself from grinning at the hint of a blush that creeps across Caleb’s cheeks. But he’s the only one who notices, he’s sure of it, and feels a little surge of relief flood through him. So long as they’re not obvious, he thinks.

The Mighty Nein have no solid plans for the rest of the day, save some shopping and re-supplying. Molly is itching to find an herbalist’s shop - a town this large has to have some sort of nefarious plant-growing operation, he’s sure of it, and he wants a sample of whatever they have to offer. Caleb wanders off after breakfast, muttering something about a bookstore, while Fjord and Beau go up to the bar to ask directions to the nearest enchanter’s shop. Jester and Nott, to Molly’s surprise, say they’ll join him in his search for an herbalist.

“Are you going to look for drugs too, Nott?” Jester asks, perhaps a little too loudly as they leave the tavern, stepping into the chilly morning air. The goblin shakes her head.

“Alchemical components,” she says from behind her mask. “It’s cold enough now that I need something to keep things from freezing in their tubes.”

“You could just stick the tubes in your pants,” Molly offers. “Keep them warm by keeping them close?”

Nott peers at him suspiciously. “Could you do that for me?” she replies. “Seeing as you’re bigger and hold a lot more hot air?”

Molly can see his breath form vaporous, gusting clouds when he laughs; with great delight Jester realizes this as well and makes a terrible dragon noise as she trots ahead, holding the flaps of her cloak aloft like wings as she rounds a corner. Nott and Molly travel at a more sedate pace, following their cleric in easy silence through the streets as she weaves and bobs through the leisurely morning crowds of townsfolk out doing their shopping, bundled up in scarves and thick cloaks. 

“Found it!” Jester calls from ahead three streets later, pointing at a hanging sign depicting a bright red agaric toadstool. The text on the sign reads **Madcap Mushroom Apothecary** , and Molly can’t resist rubbing his hands together. He is willing to wager just about anything he’ll be able to find something _interesting_ here.

“Right behind you, darling,” he calls back, but Jester’s already disappeared into the warm shop, leaving Nott and Molly to hustle after her.

“By the way,” Nott says, low and vehement right as Molly’s opening the door, “if you hurt him, I will kill you, and they will never find your body, do you understand?”

Molly chokes on the spit in his own damn mouth, spluttering as Nott strolls into the shop in front of him, making a beeline for Jester and the array of potions already on the counter in front of her.

“Oh no, Molly, are you getting sick?” Jester asks as he continues coughing all the way inside. She turns to the gnome behind the counter, whose mustard-yellow cardigan bears little toadstool buttons. “Quick! What do you have for people who are getting sick?!”

“We have all sorts of honey lozenges for coughs,” the gnome begins, wide-eyed and startled. As Molly’s leaning against the counter, still in the process of clearing his throat, he sees Nott, in front of a display shelf, slip a shiny silver tea diffuser into her pocket while the shopkeep is distracted.

For a moment they lock eyes, before Nott gives him a barely-perceptible nod. Molly returns it and swears he can see her smile behind the mask before she scurries over into the next aisle of dusty glass jars and boxes of glassware.

In the end, Molly leaves the Madcap Mushroom with three new healing potions, no drugs, some spiced teas he’s sure they’ll all be grateful for on chilly mornings on the road, a packet of honey-lemon lozenges Jester insisted on buying for him, and a silent agreement that, for now, his goblin companion would not flay him with a rusty dagger for kissing the party’s resident wizard.

All in all, not the worst day Molly’s ever had.


End file.
